It's like the X-Files for fish.
I came across this way back in the day, when I used to work in Labrador. It's been on my Facebook profile for almost four years, but I just happened to stumble upon it again a few minutes ago.
I think it's worth sharing here. I find it humourous on so many levels...though one could argue against supplying funding to the CBC over this one...
Please note: This is an actual transcript. I did not modify it in any way to make it read like a Doctor Seuss story. I'm serious.
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GLOWING FISH IN RIGOLET:
Green glowing salmon and trout are being caught just outside of Rigolet in Labrador.
Wednesday, August 01, 2007 08:48AM Item # 17
CBC Radio St. John's
RAMONA DEERING: Green glowing salmon and trout being caught just outside of Rigolet. We're not kidding you. When fisher Fred Shiwak saw it he couldn't believe it and he told his story to reporter Rochelle Borlais.
ROCHELLE BORLAIS: Take me back to the beginning of, of the first fish you caught and how you found out it came to glow.
FRED SHIWAK: Yes, I caught the first salmon about two weeks ago and I had a drying, drying split and I had a couple of pieces out, on the split drying for like to eat so one night, the next night then, my wife got up around eleven thirty, I suppose, and she said, go get the water, or a glass of juice or something. And she looked alongside [inaudible] and she saw something glowing in the night, right. And she thought it was her phone, phone off the hook or something anyway, the cordless phone. Yes and she went out, I'm going to grab the phone, she grabbed the salmon instead.
ROCHELLE BORLAIS: Oh my.
FRED SHIWAK: And then she started bawling at me and getting everybody up, up and look at the fish, yes, it's glowing in the night it was.
ROCHELLE BORLAIS: Tell me exactly what it looked like.
FRED SHIWAK: It was like colored green and it's like, like a glow, it's, I don't know, it's like, it's like a light, like it's glowing, glowing in the night, right, like in them little things you has for kids and that, like glows in the night.
ROCHELLE BORLAIS: And so can you see like all the, do all the insides glow as well?
FRED SHIWAK: Yes, you could see right through, right? But there's about half of the salmon, I'd say, about half of the side of the salmon I had there, a piece of it, it's about ten pounds of salmon, yes, and it's glowing in the night and we didn't know what was going on, right.
ROCHELLE BORLAIS: Tell me about the next one you discovered.
FRED SHIWAK: My first trout, too, I seen there last night. I came out, out the room there around twelve o'clock, so and so I go off for a drink of water, and goodness gracious, I looked at my trout, it was glowing too in the night. And it's right all over that trout was glowing, it was completely glowing, everything was bright right up, you know.
ROCHELLE BORLAIS: You said that you could, if you put your hand over it, it would make your hand glow too, that's how strong it was.
FRED SHIWAK: Oh yes, yes, the same as the salmon too. I touched the trout last night, see if get on my fingers, like tops of your fingers, like I touched it like that. And every finger on my hand was glowing too in the night.
ROCHELLE BORLAIS: So what, what did you think? I mean what did you think was the cause of this?
FRED SHIWAK: I don't know, I couldn't think of nothing. So the salmon I had I went to the older people, like the elders, right, like fishermen all their lives, like that, and so I asked them did they see a fish like that in their lives, they said no, that's the first time they heard tell of it.
ROCHELLE BORLAIS: And so and who did you contact next?
FRED SHIWAK: I contacted our rural fishery officer.
ROCHELLE BORLAIS: And so what have they done now? Where, where have, where's your salmon gone?
FRED SHIWAK: I don't know, he's gone out to the lab out in St. John's, I believe it is, that's where they're going to send it to anyway. But I never hear from them now since they sent it out. The fish lab is
here again now same two I gave them to their [inaudible] they're back here again now I'm going to find out now this afternoon I'm going to talk to them, you know, see if they hear anything about it.
ROCHELLE BORLAIS: So you're going to turn over your, your trout to them too?
FRED SHIWAK: No, not yet, I've already told them no, now today, hopefully today. I still got the trout here like put away there.
ROCHELLE BORLAIS: So tell me, tell me about where you do your fishing.
FRED SHIWAK: It's called, it's not out far, maybe a couple of kilometers out across the big island they calls, right, onto the big island there, big island we calls it all the time right.
ROCHELLE BORLAIS: And when you caught these, these fish, did they look
normal? I mean, did they seem the way they always are?
FRED SHIWAK: Oh yes, yes, you wouldn't of took notice of them, nobody would've took notice until you seen them in the night, right. They're normal like in the daytime, right.
ROCHELLE BORLAIS: And is there any signs of contamination or any industrial sites or anything near, near the body of water that you fish?
FRED SHIWAK: Not around there, no.
ROCHELLE BORLAIS: I mean, it's bizarre, have you heard any other fishermen with similar stories?
FRED SHIWAK: No, never heard nothing. I tried to find out now since I had my salmon, right, I went out to see four elders like they fished all their lives, no, they said, never heard tell of it, never saw it, never seen nothing like that.
ROCHELLE BORLAIS: It seems strange that two different fish now are starting to glow in your home and I'm wondering if there's anything maybe in your house that could be causing this. Are you cleaning the fish with anything different than you usually do?
FRED SHIWAK: Oh no, no, nothing at all, just the same, water and scrap
it off, let the blood and that out and all.
ROCHELLE BORLAIS: Oh wow. So I guess you haven't been eating these,
these fish then, have you.
FRED SHIWAK: Well, that salmon I had, I mean, the first salmon I caught, I had it split into a couple of pieces, right. I did eat part, like the rest of it, right and somebody else did too, a couple of my friends or something too right. I don't know if it was all over the salmon or not but it was like salmon it was like only but parts of it, right, like the half, half a salmon, right.
ROCHELLE BORLAIS: So you didn't get sick or anything.
FRED SHIWAK: No, no, I never got, we never got sick or nothing. But the trout I got here now it's really, really, really bad, that one. It's really all over, it's all over the, all over the trout right.
ROCHELLE BORLAIS: So are you going to lay off the fishing now for a bit until you find out what's going on?
FRED SHIWAK: No, no, I still got a net out.
ROCHELLE BORLAIS: Well, let us know, would you, if any more of your fish glow.
FRED SHIWAK: Okay then.
RAMONA DEERING: What a story that is. That was reporter Rochelle Borlais talking to Fred Shiwak in Rigolet.
